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MOUNT LIAMUIGA VOLCANO HIKE on Basseterre, St Kitts This was a fun extreme way to celebrate a birthday.

Day 5 Birthday Dinner

Dinner for Night 1:

We just got off from this itinerary last Sunday. I hope you and yours have a wonderful time and that you get as wonderful weather as we did!! If you're into such things, I believe there are three martini-making classes, the first being this afternoon, with Patrick in the Champagne bar. Have fun and smooth sailing!!! My favorite spot on the ship: Second favorite, in the evening after dinner - they have a piano/violin duo playing classical music and it's heavenly.

Firstly let me thank all on this site for the knowledge they have shared, being a new cruiser i didnt know what to expect but the information and friendliness shared on this site has made me less worried about things. For me this upcoming cruise has been a long time coming, in fact over 20 years, it's a bucket list item that i thought i would never be able to tick off! I have dragged my wife to some strange cities and countries around the world, be it on vacation or for work but one thing i could never do was get her to go on a cruise due to her dislike ( thats an understatement ) of water. However this year as this trip is for my 50th birthday she had to relent 🙂 hopefully this cruise is the first of many! We fly British Airways (BA)from a very cold and wet North East of Scotland on Thursday, heading to New York via Heathrow with a 7hr layover in JFK before boarding our Delta flight down to Peurto Rico for a 2 day stay before our cruise. I booked both of these flights as soon as i was able to (11 months out) and i have watched prices daily, BA has never dropped, Delta i could have saved a little ($100) if i waited one month. Since then prices have risen so it was a good idea to ignore my wifes advice to wait until 2 or 3 months out. The hotel of choice having read good reports on it was the Sheraton in Old San Juan, right opposite the cruise port or so i thought! Thanks to info on here i found out that RC leave from another terminal, that along with the fact my wife saw a photo of a hotel with a beach with hammocks on it where we could just chill on our first day sipping cocktails after a long flight, i decided a change was needed, booked the Courtyard by Marriot Isla Verde ( yes the one with hammocks) as soon as dates appeared available and since then i was watched the prices rocket, so again good idea to book as soon as you can. The cruise itself was booked through a UK travel agent, i didnt have a clue which one to use but noticed one was giving you a price match, $100 OBC and free drinks package and 6 bottles of red wine if you booked through them, the wine was the deciding factor and i must admit they tasted nice. Room is an oceanview on deck 9, i wanted a balcony but had to compromise as my wife wasn't keen on a balcony on first cruise. For UK cruisers i used trivago to look for best deal on hotel, skyscanner for flights and just searched for best deal on cruise, i then went onto TOP CASHBACK and used that as a link to BA, Booking.com and company for insurance and have ended up with a £200 payback which is extra money to spend on holiday ONBOARD Voom purchased for my wife using OBC so she can keep in touch with family back home As i got drinks package FOC, theres no point adding up bar bill to see if i break even, also the fact as im scottish the batterey would probably run out an calculator from over use😂😂 Schedule Thursday 22nd Aberdeen to Newyork Friday 23rd New York to Peurto Rico : 2 night stay CRUISE ITERNERARY BASSETERRE, ST KITTS & NEVIS ST. JOHNS, ANTIGUA CASTRIES, ST. LUCIA BRIDGETOWN, BARBADOS PHILIPSBURG, ST. MAARTEN Back to San Juan SJU TO JFK As we just like to wing it and decide what we want to do when we wake up or sober up lol, the only things we have planned are Bernards tours in St Maarten and Atlantis Submarine in Barbados ( another bucket list item so i had to bribe my wife for this one) After the cruise we head back to the big apple and heres where the bribery kicks in, a 2 night stay in the Grand Hyatt in NYC taking in the xmas lights etc, ice skating in Bryant Park even though i've never skated in my life( just as well i have idiots abroad travel insurance) some Xmas shopping at Jersey gardens, however my wife wants to visit Tiffany's for her present 😞 and just when i thought everything was done and i could relax without having to spend anymore more money, John Legend announces a tour where his only New York date corresponds with our time there and knowing full well what my wifes reaction would be if we get there and she see's advertisements for his concert, its easier for me to have a quiet life if i just open my wallet and purchase 2 tickets All packed and counting down the days 🙂 Ray

“Minute to Win It” was one of my favorite game shows. So when I found out the Serenade had a version of it called “In 60 Seconds or Less”, I made sure I took part in it. They needed two volunteers for the first game so I was was quick to raise my hand to play. At almost the same time as I did, two kids volunteered too. I almost backed out to let them play but the game master did not want then playing against each other. So there I was, lined up against an 11 year old kid. (I felt like a big bully) The game was knocking cups off a table in 60 seconds or less with air from a balloon we’d inflated. I was first to play. I managed to knock off 4 of 8 balloons before the time was up. The boy was down to five cups at about 30-40 seconds on the clock. (I was thinking, “He’s not gonna do it... I don’t want a rematch... I’m gonna win—yeah!!!(with matching fist pump in my mind)”. But he knocks off one more cup before his time was up. No rematch ... it was declared a tie! Here’s the funny thing... it turned out the boy was @bcarney‘s son.

“Dancing Under the Stars” by the Pool I’m pretending this is MY party

I normally try to eat healthy, but today I’m having this ... ... because I’m going on the Liamuiga Volcano Hike today... and it’s my birthday.

Day 2 Lunch at Izumi

Day 2 Breakfast at Reflections

Day 9 - Embarkation Day #2 We were able to get into our hotel room yesterday pretty early, and get started on laundry. After V took a nap, we went to the hotel restaurant for dinner. I would skip this if I were to stay there again. Then we spent a little time in the pool, then back to pack and go to bed. This morning, we got up and went back to Southern Charm Cafe for breakfast. This quickly became a family favorite. It is very tasty food, and the servers are all great. We got a "late" start to the port, arriving at the rental car return around 10:15. We were at the port around 10:30, and there was no line for security. Much different from Oasis, and more similar to Majesty last year. The port staff were a little rude, maybe they had a case of the Mondays. They were already boarding when we checked in, so we went straight onto the ship. We were playing ping-pong by 10:45. Part of the pool deck was being refinished, so they had it partially closed. We went to Windjammer for lunch, and it was pretty tasty. The rest of the day has been relatively uneventful. We love the grand suite. Lots of room. Overall, Enchantment definitely seems tired, and not as well taken care of as Majesty even was. We did head to NextCruise after Muster drill. We now have a 2BR ATS booked on Oasis in Feb 2020. We're also looking to upgrade Anthem to a Grand Loft suite, as we found out we're having to cancel the Mariner GC due to scheduling with our new business opening. While we were at NextCruise, V passed out on Abby. She had been getting cranky. She napped in the Centrum for about 1.5 hours. Then we headed back up to the room, and are currently taking advantage of the free room service, and room service from the MDR. A reminder that this is not, in fact, Oasis of the Seas, but a great view of the Ocean from the bar.

Departing from Jacksonville... ready for paperless boarding

HI all, I am in port Canaveral sitting in my hotel room this morning and excited to board Oasis of the the Seas today. This is my 27th cruise, but our first time on an Oasis class ship so I am super excited. I have had this cruise booked for a year now, after getting an unbelievable on cyber Monday last year so I have $400 OBC this cruise. This is also our first cruise as diamond, so our first time not getting the drink package in a while. The OBC will help. Because it is a holiday cruise, their were no specialty dining packages available in the cruise planner. We will be stopping in Nassau, St. Thomas, and St. Maarten this cruise. I am excited. I have not been to St. Thomas and St. Maarten in a while. I have 2 excursions booked outside of the cruise. For St. Thomas we are doing the "Taphus sips and bites tour" and for St. Maarten, we are doing the Bernard's island tour and then will likely come back to the boardwalk and get some drinks. In Nassau, I plan to just get off and have some drinks and appetizers. Starting at our favorite restaurant in Nassau, Athena cafe. My plan is to get conch fritters and their basil martini. :). We stayed last night at the holiday inn vacation club in port canaveral. I am an IHG credit card holder, so I used my annual certificate to redeem the room. The fee to maintain the card is $75, so I feel that I got a bargain on this room for $75. We arrived here early yesterday morning from Cincinnati. Lyft from MCO to the hotel was $61.72, and super easy! Our room was not ready yet so we checked our bags at the resort, and headed to Grills for lunch right next to where Navigator of the Seas was parked. I had the fish tacos which I was able to choose my fish for. ( I got fresh tuna, sushi style) and an IPA. The tacos were delicious. DL got the burger which also looked great! After lunch, we caught an uber to the taproom and Florida beer company which was a great atmosphere with lots of TV's. I enjoyed their southernmost wheat beer and DH got a flight and then purchased some IPA's for the hotel room. The weather is amazing in florda today, 60's and breezy so I wasn't as inspired to go into the amazing pool and lazy river at the hotel. Once they called and said our room/villa was ready, we headed back to the hotel. I sat out by the pool bar for a while and listened to the band, which was great. I also had a $3 mimosa, and they had a happy hour starting at 4. Our room was perfectly situated facing the channel so my favorite thing about the hotel was watching the cruise ships depart and come into the channel this morning. Yesterday, we watched Carnival breeze, the norwegian EPIC, the Disney fantasy, 2 other ships, and lastly Navigator of the Seas. This morning I woke up early, and saw Oasis come in about 5:30 am. Since then Carnival liberty and Carnival sunshine also sailed in. The lighting was perfect for the Sunshine. My plan is to head to the gym now and then possibly take a float in the lazy river prior or check out the beach prior to boarding oasis this morning. We are less than a mile from the port, so it will be an easy uber or lyft ride. The hotel also has a tram to the beach every 15 minutes, but I have not yet been. I don't have Wifi onboard, so i will update the blog, but it will be delayed. I am hoping to do Chef's table tonight or tomorrow night if I can get a special offer on board and since we have so much OBC. I am also tempted to take the Guacomole class at Sabor on one of the sea days. I did the sushi class on our grandeur of the seas cruise in march, and really enjoyed it!

The baristas at Cafe-Lattitude made me this!

Paper Plane Making Contest at the Centrum Got a keychain

More day 1 photos!

Lying in bed shattered from a day of sightseeing and extreme shopping! Honestly shopping with your wife when black friday sales are on should come with a government health warning, its not only bad for your bank balance but also your health being dragged into the same shop numerous times because they cant make their mind up. Took Uber from hotel in isla verde to old san juan at 8am cost for uber was $10 which is half the price of normal taxi, got back to hotel at 7pm Was strange walking about seeing sights for the first time but knowing about them from previous blogs. People were so friendly and helpful, food was delicious, definitely a place i would revisit cruise day tomorrow so my wife is sleeping after our tiring day, being a smoker last thing i do at night is go down and outside hotel when i want a smoke, problem is i have to walk past bar each time i do so im now on 12 pints a day Tomorrow i finally get to experience everything i have read about, like a child at xmas dont think i will get much sleep tonight

After 24hrs of travel finally arrived in San juan, hotel is great with a fantastic view, bar right on beach which is great, less distance to travel. 1st drink of the day ( not sure what day it is though lol )

Finally its arrived Cases at door, taxi booked to take us to the worst Airport i have ever been in and a surprise visitor to see us off on our holidays, just a shame she's asleep lol

Day 10 - CocoCay The seas are completely flat right now, so we were able to dock at CocoCay with no issue. We did breakfast in the Windjammer since it is right above us. Tendering went easy, then it was a short walk to our cabana, #12. Overall, the cabana is quite nice, but I preferred the bungalow we had on Labadee. The layout was nicer, and the amount of beach and water per capita was more. The cabana on CocoCay was nice at lunch however, as there is a special lunch area for suites and cabana rentees. It was very easy to get food, without the huge crush of people like there was at Labadee. Overall, I think we prefer Labadee. The music was quite loud at the cabanas, so it was tough to relax some. I think part of it was to cover the noise of construction. While in no way did that ruin our experience, it definitely could be heard, and I would assume it will get worse. Here are some photos of the construction, pier, and from our cabana. I'm hard pressed to believe that the will be completed with the pier by January... Dinner tonight was in Chops, the lone specialty restaurant on-board. We booked during embarkation day for a 20% discount from one of the waiters. We wanted to compare Chops here vs. Oasis. Chops on Enchantment is much better. Food was seasoned better, and overall was more enjoyable. We did dine with Virginia, and she loved the shrimp and caesar salad. Our waitress, Teresa, was amazing with her, and kept asking to come home with us for Christmas. I had the same menu I had on Oasis, and each course was better on Enchantment. The restaurant is also much bigger on Enchantment, but was not very busy. For dessert, Abby had the red velvet cake, but liked the one on Oasis better. I had warm chocolate cake with ice cream. Virginia had ice cream. She was trying to get every last drip of melted ice cream that Teresa noticed and asked her if she was trying to put a hole in the bottom of the bowl. 2 minutes later, another bowl of ice cream showed up. "Don't you even think about it Mom!" We then took V to Adventure Ocean, and we headed to an empty VCL to relax and enjoy the view. This cruise seems very empty, even through there is almost a full load. The captain's speech mentioned there were over 700 children on the cruise, but I feel like a lot of them are teens. AO drop-off on night 1 was a very long process, but that's due to how the AO is set-up, and it is quite small. Especially compared to Oasis. Top cruiser this cruise has 1749 nights. After a little while in the VCL, in came the Honeymooner reception, so we decided to leave. Young love, gross... We picked up V and came back to the room to go to sleep. The next day we will be docked in Nassau. I forgot to mention on Day 9, but we did go to the casino for a little while, and ran into my favorite dealer from Majesty, Deborah from Italy. Her and Brendan from Zimbabwe are both on Enchantment now. They were so much fun on Majesty, and we still talk about them from time to time. It's one of those things that you wonder if you'll ever see someone again, and it was great to run across them. Also, the Activities Director is Mo, who was the AD on Majesty last year as well. Random thoughts - Abby and I decided that we do still like small ships, but it's more for a cruise that would be just the two of us, and not V. Ginny is having fun, but Oasis class is a lot more for her to do. - There is a lot of cosmetic upgrades going on. A lot of the things @twangster pointed out in his live blog are still existent, but seem to be slowly getting remedied. Nothing major, but she needs a lot of paint. Theres definite signs of salt wear and rust. - The GS is right beneath the Windjammer, so there is a lot of foot traffic noise. Kind of weird, since this is the only location of suites. - We can also hear a lot of noise from our neighbors, and people walking down the hall. We knew when our neighbors had their breakfast delivered this morning, and that one of them stirs cream and sugar in their coffee cup. - The crew have been amazing, again. And, the small ship vibe is a change from Oasis, but one we enjoy. - The centrum is nice and open, but the layout of the shops is very weird. Almost a maze to get through, and the salespeople feel a little more like used car salespeople...

Day 2 Dinner at Reflections

DAY 2 Waking up to this view is awesome!

Welcome Aboard Show

Personalized magnet for my door

Day 4: Athens Overnight, the Rhapsody had made the long haul around the corner of Greece, and was headed towards Pireaus and Athens. I got up early to enjoy a cup of coffee up on deck and watch the sun rise. We weren't scheduled to make port until noon, so we decided to take the girls swimming as soon as the pool was open. My wife stayed in the hot tub, and I got in and out of it as the middle girls decided to move between the hot tub and pool. Too late, we decided that we should have taken a picture of my daughter in the pool and the lifeguard wearing a coat and beanie hat. We let them swim for about an hour, and they had a great time, and turns out the pool water wasn't as cold as I was expecting- not bath water by any means, but definitely not frigid. After the pool we went back to our cabin, got ready for the day, and headed up to Windjammer for lunch. While we were eating, we watched the ship dock and saw Athens in the distance. I could even see the Acropolis faintly. Later, while talking with our tour guide, she told us that the weather could not have been more perfect, and the visibility is just about as good as she'd ever seen in Athens...no smog or humidity, bright sun, and just enough breeze to blow anything out of the way. As we were leaving WJ, Captain Tobias informed us that we had been cleared to go ashore, so we quickly went to our cabin to grab our day bags and continued down to the gangway on deck 1. I had scheduled an independent, private tour of the Acropolis and Ancient Agora, including transfers for today, and we were met by our driver immediately upon leaving the terminal. It took about 30 minutes to drive from the port to the Acropolis, with our driver pointing out things of interest along the way, mostly sights from the 2000 Olympics. He even pulled over at an overlook to let us take a picture of the harbor. We were delivered right to the bus parking lot at the Acropolis and promptly met by our guide. After purchasing our tickets (half-price because it was off-season, and kids under 18 free, by the way), we started the hike up the hill. Our guide, Marialena from Greeking.me, was fantastic and great with the girls. She took us all around the Acropolis, and stopped at various places to tell us the myths about this most important of places in Athens. Another benefit of being off season was that the sight was not crowded at all and the weather was perfect: sunny but not hot. After we descended from the Acropolis, we walked past Mars Hill where the Apostle Paul gave his famous speech to the Athenians and on to the Agora. Our girls were enthralled by the stories of Greek myths and walking around the ancient marketplace, looking up at the Parthenon, I could put myself back in that time. All in all, it was a great tour and well worth booking a private tour (I feel like I may be becoming a private tour snob!). We then had some free time to wander for about an hour before our transfer back to the ship. Arriving back at port, we headed to WJ for dinner and watched as the Rhapsody pulled away and out of Piraeus. The girls went up on the pool deck to watch Incredibles 2, while my wife and I enjoyed some time alone and went to the Love and Marriage gameshow, which was hilarious. It was by then time to turn in and get some sleep, with a lazy morning ahead of us again the next day.